Phantom Fungus

[Monte At Home]

Well, I think you may be pointing at the problem right there: the creature was created to fill a metagame need.

Well, I hear where you're coming from, but this is true of lots of monsters. Dire monsters were created so that there were higher power animals for druids and rangers. The stirge is interesting because its only dangerous in large numbers (and is a low-power ability score damaging monster). The rust monster is the ultimate "threat to your stuff" encounter. Etc. etc. Most good monsters have an actual game design reason to exist. These monsters are popular.

That's the problem I see with lots of new monsters--they might have a neat picture or whatever, but they don't offer the game anything new. (For the record, in my opinion, we don't ever need another dog monster that howls, bat monsters that shriek, no more dangerous humanoids that don't do anything an orc wouldn't do, and no more monsters that looks like treasure but actually attacks--those niches are full to bursting.)

But I'm derailing my own thread here. To perhaps use your point but twist it a bit, I'm starting to suspect (actually I thought this for a while) that plant/fungus monsters can easily be seen as silly. I suspect that if you called this the "dark reaper" or something and made it an invisible demon-thing with the same stats, it would be a better monster. Thus, a good monster needs to be "neat" (as you said) and also have a purpose in the game. This isn't really news, but rather an examination of what "neat" really is (which is always a good topic).

 

[Wycen]

I've never used the phantom fungus, or the ethereal filcher/marauader, though I also do not believe I have ran a game where these monsters would be a credible threat to the party, unless they encountered a dozen phantom fungus, which would still probably be easily dealt with by a couple well timed fireballs.

However as a player I have seen a phantom fungus in play. We were playing a Planescape game and the party got mazed. Our maze turned out to be a ruined cracked-mirror reflection of Sigil. We found the Temple of Xan Yae, my PC being a cleric of her, and it was overgrown with vegetation, including assassin vines, a massive tree that was disintigrated and thus caused part of the temple to collapse, phantom fungi, and these strange thorny "animals" that shot a spray of thorns at us.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Well, I hear where you're coming from, but this is true of lots of monsters. Dire monsters were created so that there were higher power animals for druids and rangers. The stirge is interesting because its only dangerous in large numbers (and is a low-power ability score damaging monster). The rust monster is the ultimate "threat to your stuff" encounter. Etc. etc. Most good monsters have an actual game design reason to exist. These monsters are popular.

That's the problem I see with lots of new monsters--they might have a neat picture or whatever, but they don't offer the game anything new. (For the record, in my opinion, we don't ever need another dog monster that howls, bat monsters that shriek, no more dangerous humanoids that don't do anything an orc wouldn't do, and no more monsters that looks like treasure but actually attacks--those niches are full to bursting.)

But I'm derailing my own thread here. To perhaps use your point but twist it a bit, I'm starting to suspect (actually I thought this for a while) that plant/fungus monsters can easily be seen as silly. I suspect that if you called this the "dark reaper" or something and made it an invisible demon-thing with the same stats, it would be a better monster. Thus, a good monster needs to be "neat" (as you said) and also have a purpose in the game. This isn't really news, but rather an examination of what "neat" really is (which is always a good topic).

But I wonder why a "Dark Reaper" is "neatier" than a "Phantom Fungus". Is it just becauses it would be a demon?
Maybe the Fungus would be more interesting if he would be an intelligent creature - I like the idea of intelligent mushrooms, though they might be bit more sci-fi-aliens than fantasy-abberations.

Mustrum Ridcully

 

[The_Gneech]

Well, I hear where you're coming from, but this is true of lots of monsters. Dire monsters were created so that there were higher power animals for druids and rangers. The stirge is interesting because its only dangerous in large numbers (and is a low-power ability score damaging monster). The rust monster is the ultimate "threat to your stuff" encounter. Etc. etc. Most good monsters have an actual game design reason to exist. These monsters are popular. ... To perhaps use your point but twist it a bit, I'm starting to suspect (actually I thought this for a while) that plant/fungus monsters can easily be seen as silly. I suspect that if you called this the "dark reaper" or something and made it an invisible demon-thing with the same stats, it would be a better monster. Thus, a good monster needs to be "neat" (as you said) and also have a purpose in the game. This isn't really news, but rather an examination of what "neat" really is (which is always a good topic).

Okay, we'll just revise my comment to being, "it was created to fill a metagame need, but doesn't also fill any in-game needs."

FWIW, I've never used rust monsters, disenchanters, or trappers for precisely this reason. They don't have story reasons to exist, or if they do they're transparently thin ones.

That's the problem I see with lots of new monsters--they might have a neat picture or whatever, but they don't offer the game anything new. (For the record, in my opinion, we don't ever need another dog monster that howls, bat monsters that shriek, no more dangerous humanoids that don't do anything an orc wouldn't do, and no more monsters that looks like treasure but actually attacks--those niches are full to bursting.)

Seconded! For that matter, with monster advancement and class levels, I'm hard-pressed to use more than a handful of the monsters that exist now. I would add that we probably don't need any more undead-that-was-never-alive (what gets raised to turn into a devourer, for instance?) or slimes, although Necromancer Games' "undead ooze" was a very cool idea.

-The Gneech

 

[Delgar]

I think there was a phantom Fungus in a Year 1 Living Greyhwak Module (Duchy of Urnst Regional). If I recall correctly our party made short work of it, using Farie Fire to its utmost effect. However, this was a LONG time ago.

Delgar

 

[Psion]

Well, I hear where you're coming from, but this is true of lots of monsters. Dire monsters were created so that there were higher power animals for druids and rangers. The stirge is interesting because its only dangerous in large numbers (and is a low-power ability score damaging monster). The rust monster is the ultimate "threat to your stuff" encounter. Etc. etc. Most good monsters have an actual game design reason to exist. These monsters are popular.

Right, but (and Gneech beat me to it again) I would use dire animals, because, well, there are many story reasons to use them. The idea of a menacing beast of legendary size, or of a spirit beast of the sort you see in Princess Mononoke, is something I can work with. For that matter, that you might encounter them in the company of druids is something I can also work with on a story level.

To perhaps use your point but twist it a bit, I'm starting to suspect (actually I thought this for a while) that plant/fungus monsters can easily be seen as silly. I suspect that if you called this the "dark reaper" or something and made it an invisible demon-thing with the same stats, it would be a better monster. Thus, a good monster needs to be "neat" (as you said) and also have a purpose in the game. This isn't really news, but rather an examination of what "neat" really is (which is always a good topic).

Perhaps. But sometimes using the neat monster all the time wears a little thin, and sometimes what you need is one of the less used monster to shake things up.

It's an odd way to put it, but sometimes the point of a less used monster is to be a less used monster.

 

[Monte At Home]

It's an odd way to put it, but sometimes the point of a less used monster is to be a less used monster.

That's a really interesting point. Of course, with so many monster books out now, I wonder if that isn't the niche of practically the entirety of say, MM 2, or CC 3, or whatever.

It's also clearly the origin of a lot of monsters throughout the game's history. Someone somewhere said, my players are bored of orcs, so now we'll have a slightly different kind of orc (orog, ogrillon, et al) as a change of pace.

 

[I'm A Banana]

It's a problem with niche and motive, not with design.

As it sits, they seem to be "marauding, stealthy predators." And low-level characters already have a glut of those to fight, invisible or not. Animals that stalk them, goblins with rogue levels, bugbears, whatever -- what's the difference, in the mind of flavor, to invisibility and a really good Hide score? It fills the same niche in the adventure design. If a DM thinks "I need a stealthy ambush attack," they've got a lot to choose from. And a phantom fungus has really *nothing* other than that to offer -- it's stealthy, sneaky, and well, I guess a plant....

Beyond being a common type of 'design' of monster, they're plants. Plants. Plants aren't evil, they aren't corrupt, they don't want to steal your treasure, they don't want to eat your family. Not like goblins do, certainly....not like a fiendish stealthy predator would. At best, they're the tools of something more intelligent, but who uses plants? Well, except for druids I guess. There's no great evil gardener threatening the city -- though there are evil undead, evil demon-summoning wizards, evil warlords. But evil shrubbery? Most plants are Neutral, and those that aren't tend to be Good, ne? Who fights fungus?

So there's the problem. They're a common trope of monster, and they hardly are a common type of monster to use. You can solve it by giving them more tricks (a poison, a spell-like ability or two, maybe a fear power), or by making more plant-based adventures......but most of the ones in existence have already been stated. There's evil druids, there's waterfalls, there's mushroom forests, there's giant trees........and here, with one exception, no one is 'sicing' them on you.

I guess there's nothing about the phantom fungus that says "I'm your beastie!"......at least, nothing that goblins and jaguars don't already do. This is compounded by their "one-trick-pony" status......they're invisible.....so?

 

[ForceUser]

Other than in the initial playtests, I can't remember ever seeing a phantom fungus in play. I can't remember ever seeing it in a product. I know as a designer and as a DM, I have never used it.

It's not that it's a bad monster. The illustration doesn't thrill me, but that's just personal taste--it's a fine illo. But something about it just says "don't use me, keep on looking..." whenever I'm looking through the MM for a monster to use. I don't know why for sure.

Do you feel this way too? Or have you used the monster? If so, how did you use it and did it work well?

I can tell you why the monster exists. We felt the game needed certain monsters in certain roles and niches. Specifically, we wanted a low-power monster that was invisible in its standard state, so that low level characters would get used to fighting invisible things now and again, and new players would see the value (and shortcomings) of invisibility early on. It also serves a role as a low-CR plant monster so druids have something to use their plant spells against.

I'm just curious, because that and the ethereal filcher may be the only two monsters (not counting animals) in the 3E Monster Manual that I've never used outside the initial 3E playtests.

I've actually used it. Once. Not that my players ever found out what it was or what it looked like. The encounter happened in a dungeon, wherein the phantom fungus snuck up on the party from behind and attacked. The encounter happened in a 10-foot wide hallway, so the party just whacked at the two adjacent squares until the fungus, nearly dead, fled. The party, disinclined to follow an invisible creature and disinterested in its true nature, let it go and continued on their way. Not a terribly exciting or interesting encounter, but I was determined to use the monster.

As for the ethereal filcher, I love the illustration and intend to use the thing one day. It just doesn't seem to fit into the standard D&D campaign, though - if I ever use one it'll probably be in a planar adventure or in a psionic campaign. I'll probably advance it or give a few levels of rogue, as well. It's on my list.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Man, you can never have too many ethereal filchers.

Ignore the illustration. But I love the monster.

-Hyp.